My Week in Titles

I don’t know about you, but I really start to struggle when I know I have to name something (a child, a book, a poem, a pet…), but some people can pluck fantastic names out of thin air and it seems effortless to them. Grrrrr

When I worked full time I had a wonderful manager who was organising training for the team and she asked me to write two lists:

Work I’m really good at and love doing

Work I’m not so good at and don’t like doing

She tricked me because she took all the things from my #2 list (like mathematics, finance and contract management) and enrolled me into training. Had I been smarter like one of my colleagues (who said they didn’t like writing, sending emails and internet searches) I would have been enrolled in some really fun courses.

Lately I’ve been thinking about how wonderful my manager was and how she steered me towards some great career goals – so I decided to write my own #1 and #2 lists to see how much my life has changed over the years and maybe get stuck into some new forms of training.

The first words to come up in my #2 list were naming things and writing titles.

Hence, the name of this post. For each day of last week I wrote a title for a book or movie and just for fun I added a genre and short description (short descriptions also give me the cold sweats).

Here goes:

Monday

Dog Fight (War) – All hell breaks loose when an elderly man finds a box of old bones in his freezer and throws them to the dogs under a house called the RUC.

Tuesday

The Horses of Cane (Comedy) – When two horses escape and declare the sugar cane fields their new race track the farmers can only look on in disbelief (with hilarious ‘R’ rated out takes).

Wednesday

Children of Satan (Horror) – A trip to The Mall becomes a nightmare for an unsuspecting shopper when she realises its school holidays.

Thursday

The Pudding Burned (Romantic Comedy) – A gas cooktop provides a valuable lesson for a married couple on how to work together when a tea-towel catches fire.

Friday

Leap (Thriller) – A man discovers how high he can jump when a red-bellied black snake crosses his path. On landing, he is shocked to learn his wife can run faster than Usain Bolt.

Saturday

Seed (Crime) – Who is stealing the bird seed? The twist in the end will shock you!

Sunday

The Line (Drama) – One woman’s struggle with a clothes line in desperate need of repair will leave you on the edge of your seat.

Which one would catch your attention of it was a movie or a book?
(you can say none of them and I promise I won’t be offended)

****

That’s enough silliness for now. If you feel like writing your week in titles just link back to this post and I’ll link you into my next post.

Here is a picture of the horses that escaped and caused chaos to the farmers on Tuesday.

Just read your blog…………..crazy but thought provoking….my favorite is “Seed.”

I’d ramble through the fast disappearing surprise of bird seed, introduce a lovely neighbor who makes homemade biscotti and another neighbor who is trying to capture wild turkeys in his garage. Several pounds of seed later and after nights of surveillance drinking hot cocoa I’d find the culprit.

The little sweet old lady next door is raiding the feeders for toppings for her biscotti. But, I’d end up liking them so much, I’d just let her continue to have fun – BUT, I would substitute somewhat human friendly seeds in the feeders. Let the birds fend for themselves!!

; D

My titles would perhaps run to the extreme, such as:

Monday: “Opps!” – the story of a couple who buys an old Victorian home, and, in the process of renovating, finds two children’s skeletons in an attic trunk. They don’t report it to the authorities because they don’t want their renovations disrupted – but try to investigate the findings on their own – with almost catastrophic results.

Tuesday: “Fillets Anyone?” – the story of a woman who marries a piranha – and feeds it her ex-boyfriends, bit by bit.

Wednesday: “Birch Shadows” – a tale of native american ghosts that appear out of the dark patches on the white birch trees in a young boy’s back yard – and how he learns their stories.

Thursday: “Find Me” – a woman’s cry for help after she becomes trapped in a circle of evil oak trees because she laughed at her aunt’s stories about witches.

Friday: “The Plot” – a middle aged, frumpy sort of soul, begins to write murder mysteries and experiments with the murders on local homeless people – and ALL the different ways to dispose of their bodies.

Saturday: “Replay” – a tale of an older woman who wakes up one morning finding herself ten years old again with the chance to change her life’s experiences – with some hilarious repercussions.

Sunday: The Moral” – stories of people who attained their fondest dream, but under circumstances that they cannot escape, with tragic results – and an occasional redemption.

Off the top of your head? WOW! You are a prolific writer and these are fantastic! It would have taken me all day to write what you just wrote in five minutes. I’m stunned…
I love them all, but my ‘dark writer’s side’ likes “Fillets Anyone?” and I think I’ll laugh about that all day. Give yourself a gold star for all of these! 😀

I love to name things, Dianne, books, characters, critters that hang around our home, I even name my exercise equipment. I recently purchased an elliptical machine and named it Elmer. I know, I’m strange! 🙂 Your photo is absolutely gorgeous!

What an absolutely gorgeous picture of those horses. Man, just wow! I think my favorite is “Seed,” but they’re all great, Dianne. I think you’re pretty dang good at this. I know what you mean though. When I have to name something i start to panic a little and then I start giving something many names so then I don’t know what to call it!

Oh – I’m so happy you like the horses, I thought at the time that the picture didn’t come out very well because they were galloping (and having such a ball!)
I’m glad you have difficulty naming things too (well, I’m not really glad, but you know what I mean) 😀

Those lists really bring out the things we should be doing instead of avoiding, Rebecca. Writing a book blurb came very close to the top and that’s really something I should practice (a lot). Great to see you here my dear 😀

The Pudding Burned and The Line for me. I can’t think of yesterday let alone tomorrow or a week away. I know woah is me. A feel good post that made me smile. Glad the gee gees got up to a bit of shannanigans! Hope you are well in your beautiful world. xxx

Brilliant! What a wonderful way to tempt the muse too, making up titles before writing the stuff seems to spark some fun ideas. My personal favourite is ‘Seed’. Now there’s a snappy title you could do almost anything with! Those horses are so beautiful…. Love, Harula xxx

I like Seed as well and am wondering if there is a book or movie with that name (probably is – I think they’ve thought of everything). I’m so glad you like the horses – they finally found their way home, thank goodness xxxx

I’m always so happy to see a new post by you, and this one is another wonderful exploration of creativity with humor and imagination, of course. I love your titles. Favorite one? Hmm, I think I go for the ‘simple’ ones, like LEAP, SEED, and THE LINE, considering what the stories are about.
As far as ‘naming’ things, my guy and I name every plant in our house, as well as some special trees in our yard. It started with our first plant we bought 30-some years ago, so I’ll use that as my title: “Be-bop-a-lula,” a novel about a coupe who can’t decide on the name for their first child. So when labor commences, the soon-to-be- father starts singing, telling his laboring wife that she must choose a name from one of the songs he sings.
Wow, that was fun. 🙂

Wow – I love that, Pam! What a great story (maybe they could call their daughter Lula). It’s amazing how things like this inspire us.
When I was staying with my daughter (who also names everything) she bought a plant and asked her hubby what he would call it and he said “Robert” – when we laughed and said we loved Robert Plant songs he was really embarrassed and wanted to change it. But to this day Robert Plant is still growing in their yard 😀

I’d love to write all these stories, Zen and this exercise made me realise that even the dullest of days can be made into a story 😀
Children of Satan was a funny day – because I don’t have any school-age children now I always get a shock when I go to the mall and there’s a load of screaming kids running around.
My boss was awesome and working for her was one of the best times of my life xxxx

Wow, wow, and wow! You pulled my leg when you said you weren’t good at coming up with titles. Those are all great. Made me laugh. I can’t think of great titles for my week off the cuff like that, but now you have me being aware of any great titles that happen to me during my day. Have a great week, Dianne.

This made me realise that even a dull life in the country can be told in a story, Char. I’m so glad you liked them and I hope they inspire you to think of titles next time you’re in the car or kitchen or watching TV – there are titles and stories everywhere in our lives 😀

I once had an employer who was so clueless about dealing with people that, when the secretarial staff refused to do any typing because they resented the expectation that they should have to wash everyone’s dishes, he decreed that the rest of us should have to do our own typing. (So much for addressing the underlying problems of sexism in the workplace.) Well, if they wanted to pay me my hourly rate to learn to type, who was I to complain?

I’ll never be a great typist, but thanks to that very expensive (for them) training course, I became competent enough that I never needed a secretary again–not for work and not for writing novels. It was so valuable, I even offered to wash the dishes!

I’ve tried to learn to type (in online courses and such) but I’m still a two fingered banger of the keys. I’m not as slow as hubby (one finger, one key at the time after a thorough search of the keyboard – painful to watch) but I kind of get there in the end.
A good boss is a treasure and they are certainly few and far between 🙂

Oh you are an inspiration Dianne… I didn’t think I’d be sitting here doing this this morning (Lol)…. but our fb comment made me want to try it…!!
Paths crossed (thriller) – Angelique’s life is put at risk every time she crosses paths with a new visitor to her quaint and quiet sea side village that she had called home since she retired from her glamourous life as a socialite in Sydney Australia – living in fear, her life will never be the same again
Paths crossed (romcom) – Angelique’s boring life as a single 35yo takes exciting and hilarious twists and turns as gets the courage to get on with life through online dating – her life is drawn into strange and exciting new events and hobbies as she shares the walk of life for the weeks she dates each possibly eligible “Mr Right”

Oh yes Jo! I’d definitely be reading these. I’m sure you have many novels inside just waiting for the moment you put your fingers to the keyboard. Angelique sounds like a great character – I love the thought of the socialite moving to a quiet sea side village to escape from ‘something’ (that would actually make a really good TV series as well!)

Those horses look to be having the time of their lives. 🙂 Love your intriguing titles, Dianne. I’ d have to choose ‘Seed’, as today I’ve been watching Sammy, Cyril and Sarah, systematically raiding the newly filled bird feeder. This definitely qualifies as a crime. One Blue Jay actually had a brief look in but was chased away by the Three Musketeers. 🙂 Beautiful photo.

Hilarious. I like Leap. I’d be the wife running like the wind. When I get an idea for a picture book manuscript it’s the title that often comes to me first. Then I have to think to make the story work with the title. Maybe we should work as a team.

You are a crack up… had me laughing out loud, sitting alone outside our van, which made passersby stare and the G.O. curious so I had to read it out to him, so he was laughing and quite rightly sums you up as a clever woman 😆
I’ve been doing a daily Instagram post, and sometimes another for the G.O.’s pics, so I’ve been trying to write catchy titles and hashtags.

“The Horses of Cane” wins hands down! I too hate title writing, it is right down there with editing, but both such necessary pieces of the writing life. Ah well, at least we also have our number one list with being inspired, investigating ideas, reading other writers, etc!

Being inspired, investigating ideas and reading other writers is definitely on the number one list, Allen. I love reading your poetry and that gives me a lot of inspiration. I’ve even started writing poetry myself (but it’s nowhere near as polished as yours) xxx

I’d definitely be up for ‘The Horses of Cane’. I’m sure that provided much amusement! My title would be ‘Seamus the Destroyer’ – also a comedy; spurred on by one of our 4 cats who has decided that my own redecoration of the house is not to his taste. He is determined to put his mark on it. This week’s focus has been the dining table where I’ve come down to find initially just the cloth and runner rearranged, and today the silk flowers toppled and strewn upon the artfully draped (scrunched up into waves) linen.

How funny! I have to vote for the horse one since now I know it’s a true story. (Hmm… makes me wonder about some of those others. I have a feeling you were drawing a lot from real life, eh? If so, will you tell?) The horses are beautiful.

I’ve missed visiting here for all the laughs! I’m horrible with names too, but luckily lots of town names or names of places are pretty boring anyway. I hope you’ve been having all kinds of fun for the last few months or so! 🙂

Thanks Dianne – it’s fun to be back! I’m hoping it’ll be out by Oct 14 believe it or not – I’m doing the marketing stuff all wrong but oh well. It seemed better to forget about all that so that I could concentrate on the book as much as possible.

You are just so fun and creative! I recently had to name my puppy (Lupa) and it took forever to find a name as we are a multi-lingual family and needed a name that worked well in many languages (and also didn’t mean anything rude in any language!!).

Haaa – I remember when I bought a Pajero car and my spanish brother-in-law used to laugh every time I said it because it obviously meant something completely different in his language 😀

Lupa is a beautiful name for a puppy. My little niece laughs every time she sees my dog because her name is Kitty and she thinks that’s the funniest name anyone could give a dog (particulalry a rottweiller) 😀

What a fun post, Dianne. It’s a strange thing with titles for me – sometimes they pop up out of nowhere really easily, and at other times it’s like trying to draw blood from a stone.
Unfortunately I don’t have time to join in your weekly list as I’m off to Barcelona for a few days.:)

the seeds one I really liked – but in a way – I think that when something is in a list – the location in the list can impact the reception of the item…. ya know? so maybe I would not have liked it as much if it was listed first….
who knows
also – I really like what you shared about your boss and their lists. Could I possibly share this (with full credit your way) on my “work” blog?

I will email you – because I also need to email you about something else…
peace

So much fun! And a great exercise to work through something that’s not your favorite. I can’t stand coming up with book titles, but I love character names. I still don’t have a title for my WIP and I am inching closer and closer to the moment when I’ll have to share it with people!

Dianne, you are the MOST creative writer I know! The titles are wonderful and the little snippets explain exactly why you write fiction! I lust after your imagination…:)
Titles are hard for nonfiction, too, though. I agonize over them.
Pretty’s knee and the election in the USA have been agony this summer and fall, also. Sigh.
Life crashes along with us, doesn’t it?
Hope all is well in the RUC.

Thanks for coming by and commenting here, Stephanie. You’re so right about the randomness factor of a title – I find that sometimes when I’m reading online news. And ditto here with coming up with titles – I’m still practicing 🙂